K L P S – K L P S Review

By Maddog

Determined to explode my word count while safeguarding my character count, K L P S is a familiar band with an unfamiliar name. The band’s 2023 debut Phantom Centre, released under the name Kollaps\e, got stuck in our filter before I yanked it out. Phantom Centre’s sludgy mix of atmosphere and eighteen-wheeler riffs made it concise and compelling, albeit one-track. Two years on, K L P S sees Sweden’s sludgers drop a backslash and four letters while adding even chunkier riffs, more atmosphere, and three non-breaking spaces.1 After an already-promising start, K L P S has taken one leap closer to being a titan of their genre.

K L P S takes Phantom Centre’s measurements and doubles each one. The riffs are bigger, with distorted rhythmic explosions that recall LLNN. Conversely, even these heavier sections come drenched in post-hardcore sorrow. Adding to the soup, K L P S’ use of chunky riffwork to build meditative atmospheres resembles stoner sludge acts like Dvne. While K L P S has amped up their extremity, K L P S’ softer pieces step up as well. The album’s sparser passages, often featuring just simple guitar melodies and ritualistic drum beats, add stark contrast to its heavyweights. Although K L P S is less rhythmic and bass-focused than Phantom Centre, it magnifies nearly every other dimension of its predecessor. The resulting record bears the familiar markers of sludge, but accentuates them all to avoid fading into irrelevance.

K L P S’ blend of heft and emotion makes every track a highlight. The album’s hulking riffs harness sludge’s power while eschewing its typical laziness, tethering themselves to ominous, infectious melodies (“Undertow”). Aided by blackened motifs, even these heavy segments ooze pathos (“Subverse”). K L P S’ descents into minimalism stand in stark musical contrast but embody the same strengths, using subtle melodic tweaks to both hypnotize and grip the listener (“Katarsis”). The record’s greatest triumph is that it never treats these diverse elements as mutually exclusive. The sections that blur the line between heart and muscle show off the best that K L P S has to offer, like the interplay of meditative guitars, post-rock ambience, and climactic riffcraft on “Tribulation.” Like Amenra before them, K L P S wields beauty and brawn in ways that are at once worlds apart and inextricable.

Although K L P S remains interesting throughout, its tracks bleed together over several listens. The album’s six songs have similar lengths and lean into similar styles, without a clear sense of evolution or climax in the tracklist. While each song navigates deftly between serene minimalism and sludgy cacophony, this style grows stale by the end. K L P S’ production choices magnify this feeling; although each instrumental line shines through, the loud master and the muddled sludge riffs make K L P S seem more repetitive than it really is. Still, these are faint splotches on an otherwise impressive record. Given its tempered 43-minute runtime, K L P S never threatens to lose my interest altogether. And when the album does prioritize buildup and climax, the results are spectacular. The closer “Aureola” takes the cake, using powerful melodies to anchor the listener before building up into oblivion and then back down into cathartic quiet. K L P S would benefit from more of this continuity overall.

K L P S has improved upon their debut on nearly every axis. While Phantom Centre was already a breath of fresh air in a moldy genre, K L P S steps up its riffs, its ambience, and its emotional weight. Displaying an uncanny level of maturity, K L P S’ sophomore release shines by blending these elements into a heady brand of sludge where the riffs have soul and the atmosphere has grit. While I wish K L P S had more ebb and flow as an album, its masterful songs keep me coming back for more. Even skeptics of sludge and post-metal owe this hidden gem a listen.

Rating: Very Good!
DR: 6 | Format Reviewed: 320 kb/s mp3
Label: These Hands Melt
Websites: kollapsemusic.bandcamp.com | facebook.com/kollapsemusik
Releases Worldwide: March 7th, 2025

#2025 #35 #Amenra #Dvne #KLPS #Kollapse #LLNN #Mar25 #PostHardcore #PostMetal #Review #Reviews #Sludge #SwedishMetal #TheseHandsMelt

À Terre – Embrasser La Nuit Review

By Thus Spoke

There’s nothing wrong with sticking to an established genre template, but it’s interesting when a band opts to mix things up. Bordeaux’s À Terre could be said to go a step further, claiming the musical DNA of their debut Embrasser La Nuit was guided by the provocative question, “Is making Cult Of Luna or Converge really that original these days?” As a sludge/post-metal ensemble, the group’s self-awareness about their debt to the big names, leads them, in Embrasser La Nuit, to sprinkle in a handful of other influences, mainly from the French rap and hip-hop scene.1 But the real question isn’t whether or not what À Terre have created makes for a novel take on post-metal or sludge. Instead, it’s a question of whether or not what they have created is good, regardless of its callbacks or imitations.

There is certainly an air of uniqueness about Embrasser La Nuit. A trap-beat-led, post-metal version of rap (“Tous Morts,”) is not something you hear often. But À Terre don’t settle into any one distinctive style so much as flick between them, and not unnaturally. Classic sludgy trudges marry well with the hardcore stompiness that rears its head on multiple occasions (“Paris sous les Tombes,” “L’Appel de la Nuit”). The post-metal leanings lend themselves by default to the passages of ambience (“ÂCÂB,” “Presque Morts,” “Nous Sommes la Nuit”), which itself pairs as easily with rap-style delivery as harsher rasps. Flashes of greatness come in the form of a cascading pattern of synths smartly woven into an escalating build (“ÂCÂB”), or an alarm-bell riff playing to the tune of a -core/sludge mash-up (“Paris sous la Tombes”). À Terre play their interpretations of these blended genres well, but as as the elements continue to brush shoulders with one another within songs, the energies give way to indistinctness. And there grows an uncomfortable sense that it all amounts to another less-than-memorable iteration of a subgenre’s core sound.

À Terre can write sludge and post-metal. They know how to craft some battering riff-rhythm patterns (“Paris sous les Tombes,” “Nous Sommes La Nuit”), throwing in some group, and layered vocals for that satisfying touch of aggression. Their atmospheric tendencies are also appropriately sombre, and chilling, particularly as they tend towards the stripped-back-to-slow build style that marks some of the best of post-metal’s traits (“ÂCÂB,” “Prophétie”). In reminding the listener of greats like Amenra, Cult of Luna, Isis, and more, passages—and by extension, tracks—gain familiarity and the halo of quality shines on them. Yet, when I hear the pained, atonal screams over minor synths and the tides of gritty chugging (“Prophétie,” “L’Appel de la Nuit”), it’s like hearing Amenra with 90% of the emotion stripped away. The gradual increases in tension and intensity that rise and fall (“ÂCÂB,” “Presque Morts”) are not unaffecting, but their impact is greatly softened by À Terre’s tendency to force, rush, or otherwise fail to properly capitalise on them. They are at best simply inserted, if still decent (“Prophétie”) and at worst, totally undeveloped (“Paris sous les Tombes,” “Presque Morts”). Likewise, the bite of the surrounding sludge feels relatively toothless thanks to the fact that the impatience that characterises the hardcore stylings infects even the stiller moments: off-the-cuff edginess bringing angsty riffage too soon, and ambience breaking sludge far too frequently and abruptly. What results are compositions lacking in conviction, possessing none of the rawness or introspection that they ought to, combining to form something awkwardly bland.

Embrasser La Nuit thus makes for a surprisingly uneventful listening experience; surprising, because everything is technically good, and yet somehow anaemic. The glimmers of brilliance are good only insofar as they are imitations, while the exceptions to the established formula in the form of ‘experimentation’ (“Tous Morts,” and, at a stretch, a more synth-heavy approach in spots across the record) are vastly too brief to create any meaningful intrigue or spice. Leaving individual tastes aside, this kind of music should never be boring, and in fairness, calling Embrasser La Nuit boring would be overly simplistic; it’s too uneven for that. There are stretches of atmospheric musing (“Prophétie”) and snappy boisterousness (“Paris sous les Tombes”) that are, in isolation, good. Their collection nonetheless leaves more than a little to be desired.

À Terre speak to the concept of originality, but ultimately, their debut does not suffer because it lacks it. It suffers because À Terre’s homages to genre mainstays fail to elicit the profoundly affecting responses in their audience that their incarnation demands. The music is a surface-level representation of its inspirations, with only glimpses of depth. With relatively little raw humanity, despite its literal components, and a lukewarm commitment to the true presence of its pugnacity and its magnitude, Embrasser La Nuit makes only the barest of impacts.

Rating: Disappointing
DR: 5 | Format Reviewed: wav
Label: Self-Release
Websites: Bandcamp | Facebook
Releases Worldwide: January 24th, 2025

#20 #2025 #ÀTerre #Amenra #CultOfLuna #EmbrasserLaNuit #FrenchMetal #Isis #Jan25 #PostMetal #Review #Reviews #SelfReleases #SludgeMetal

Pillar of Light – Caldera Review

By Thus Spoke

A Caldera is a hollow resulting from the collapse of a volcano’s magma chamber, normally after an eruption. This lasting effect of catastrophe, in the form of a deep depression, describes a mental state as much as it does a geological phenomenon. Pillar of Light—who dedicate their debut Caldera to late friend Steven Jon Muczynski (Hollow Earth/Tharsis They)—channel this state in an unflinching exploration of mortality and misery. Through a crushing brand of sludgy doom, Pillar of Light rain bitter feelings and agonized resignation in a shower of pathos as massive and confrontational as that haunting, incandescent door.

It can be paradoxically enjoyable to indulge in one’s gloominess, and Caldera takes this right to the brink of real despair. With Aaron Whitfield screaming pure sadness and spite over the deceptively simple interplay of Scott Christie, Alex Kennedy, and James Obenour’s resonant riffs and crushing chords, to the pulse of Eric Scobie’s thump and crash, Pillar of Light ensures that every note, beat, and breath hits you firmly and squarely in the chest. The presence of reverberant guitar in a dense production is weighty enough, trudging bleakly along to sluggardly sludge, But it grants a solidity also to the mournful refrains that spill down out of an opening in the grey cloud in delicate atmospheric drops, or a downpour of rich tremolo. In their violence, and patient creep towards devastating, destructive outpourings, Pillar of Light frequently reminds me of Amenra—almost too much at times, though such a comparison is only a good thing for Caldera’s effectiveness.

If Caldera is designed to rip your heart out, then it succeeds. Drums and concrete guitar batter and beat you down, you crawl along the tense path of blunt near-dissonance, your breath catches in moments of atmospheric anticipation, or a shivering build, and then is knocked clean from you as you collapse in a devastatingly beautiful catharsis. If you’re me, listening alone in my flat on a dark November evening, you’re crying. If you’re not me, you might not be crying, but you’d have to have a heart of stone not to be moved by the grief (“Leaving”), the despair (“Infernal Gaze”), and the surrender (“Certain End”) that bleeds out of these massive mournful melodies. More muted harmonies bleed with apathy (“Wolf to Man,” “”Spared,” “Unseeing”) before they too succumb to pulchritudinous despair. Venomous barks and somber spoken-word become a mantra of misery as they repeat over blunt and beautiful themes alike (“Wolf to Man,” “Infernal Gaze”). Quiet should be taken gratefully, even as delicately wrought plucks precipitate further despondence (“Leaving,” “Eden,” “Unseeing”).

Across its near-hour-long runtime, Caldera hardly lets up on its emotional abuse, changing only the manner in which it assaults. “Spared” and “Unseeing,” etched with screeching slides, are cold and depressive whether dwelling in ringing atmospheres or dissonant chugging. Unflinching and inexorable next to the more overtly pathetic “Leaving,” and “Infernal Gaze,” with “Unseeing”‘s battering, disharmonic conclusion setting the stage for “Certain End”‘s crippling finale. Only the aptly-titled “Eden” offers peace in its three instrumental minutes that bridge “Spared,” and “Infernal Gaze,” its hazy, perhaps overlong reprieve serving to make “Infernal Gaze” that much more devastating. If one wanted to trim anything, taking a smidge out of “Eden” could be a start, while “Unseeing” could also be pared down. In all honesty, however, Caldera doesn’t feel nearly as long as it is. Something else worthy of note is that “Certain End” hits with a particular type of nostalgic intimacy due its theme reminding me very strongly of Amenra’s “A Solitary Reign.” It took me a couple of listens to realize the reason it felt so familiar, but I wouldn’t class it as plagiarism, just strong inspiration that makes a good song better.

It seems that every year, something lands right at the cusp of list season that threatens to demolish the neatly-considered line-up. Pillar of Light are guilty of this terrible timing as they single-handedly snatch my personal Best Doom of the Year title. Stunning by itself, as a debut Caldera sets a heavy precedent and stamps a deep imprint on the scene. As enduring as its namesake, Caldera is gorgeous and heartbreaking, and it won’t let me go.

Rating: Great
DR: 7 | Format Reviewed: 320 kb/s mp3
Label: Transcending Obscurity
Websites: Bandcamp | Facebook
Releases Worldwide: December 6th, 2024

#2024 #40 #Amenra #AmericanMetal #Caldera #Dec24 #DoomMetal #DoomSludge #PillarOfLight #PostMetal #Review #Reviews #Sludge #TranscendingObscurityRecords

Silhouette – Les Dires de l’​Â​me Review

By Carcharodon

There’s a little bit of buzz about Montpellier, France’s Silhouette, ahead of their full-length debut, Les Dires de l’​Â​me. This is built on the undeniable strength of their 2022 EP, Les retranchements (which, passing the 30-minute / seven-track mark as it did, was arguably an LP but that’s by the by). There, the sextet blended various styles, including black and post-metal, and shoegaze to create a dark and dreamy atmosphere, which oscillated between ghostly beauty and harsh, post-black fury. A lot of the credit for those moods must go to Silhouette’s dual vocalists, Ondine and Yharnam, who serve up gorgeous (female) cleans and anguished (male) post-hardcore screams, respectively. Now extending themselves into longer-form album creation, can the French group conjure up similarly enchantments on Les Dires de l’Âme?

If Les retranchements found Silhouette lost in a disturbing daydream, Les Dires de l’Âme sees them trapped in a labyrinthine nightmare of dense, swirling banks of bittersweet emotion. At times, honeyed darkness, at others crawling horrors, it’s the sort of thing you wake up from wide-eyed, shaking and moist with sweat. Evoking the hopeless misery of Amenra, combined with the gossamer, ethereal turbulence of Sylvaine’s Nova, Silhouette simply sweep you along with them on this journey. Despite running to a relatively modest 45 minutes, the sheer scale and grandeur, the epic feel, packed into this record’s short run, remind me of Hulder’s Verses in Oath. However, Les Dires de l’Âme is a significantly more diverse record, subtly shifting between, at one end of the spectrum, soaring, percussion-free laments (“L’Appel”) and huge, oppressive post-black, doom-tinged pieces (title track), at the other. At their most effective, however, Silhouette seamlessly blend these two sides of their sound, allowing them to twist into and around each other (“Catalepsie”).

Undoubtedly Silhouette’s greatest asset is its vocalists. On Les Dires de l’Âme, Ondine and Yharnam voices combine to create something of the magic found on Cult of Luna and Julie Christmas’ collaboration, Mariner. Although Silhouette also attracts the post-metal tag, they have relatively little in common with Cult of Luna musically (though see “Silhouette”, where a few similarities surface in the guitar work), save for that feeling that the dueling vocals of Joanne’s Persson and Christmas were able to call forth. The shades of light and dark, beauty and pain are spellbinding, even more so when the two run in parallel, with Yharnam howling over Ondine’s airy, elegant cleans (“Une Lame Éprise,” and the back end of “Dysthymie”). All this praise for the vocalists should not detract from the work of guitarists Achlys and Vyartha. Together, they deliver towering post-metal soundscapes that crush like calving glaciers, alongside blackened tremolos but also delicately melodic, picked passages, which enhance the trance-like reverie. In places, the guitar work reminds me of the most recent Downfall of Gaia (“Une Lame Éprise” and the title track), in others Alcest’s Écailles de Lune. Zhand’s drumming is similarly deft in touch, with progressive fills and restrained, almost post-rock, beats featuring as often as the metronomically precise blasts.

It’s not just the songwriting, but also the overall pacing and structuring of the album, that makes Les Dires de l’Âme the massive success it is. Silhouette’s ability to glide between harsh and delicate, or soften the blackened edges of their sound, both through Ondine’s voice but also the keen melodies of Achlys guitar, are second to none. They also made some bold writing choices, like on “Adoubée des étoiles,” which sees Yharnam take a back seat, as Ondine’s vocals are double-tracked to stunning effect over claustrophobic, brooding guitar lines. The production is also generally strong, with drum sound particularly rich, which is not always the case for post-black bands. The positioning of the vocals in the mix also plays to their strength, putting them front and centre, allowing Ondine’s voice in particular to take flight, but without totally dominating.

The cover art, depicting a shrouded soul drifting up from a broken corpse toward a dark and starry sky, is a good metaphor for what Silhouette created with Les Dires de l’Âme. A haunting experience from start to finish, it is one that could so easily have fallen prey to the twin pitfalls of over-indulgent writing and terrible production. It did not and that is hugely to Silhouette’s credit. They have crafted a hypnotic debut, which will truly be hard to top on their next outing. Don’t be surprised to see this appearing on some year-end Lists (including mine).

Rating: 4.0/5.0
DR: 6 | Format Reviewed: 320 kb/s mp3
Label: Antiq Records
Websites: silhouettebm.bandcamp.com | facebook.com/SilhouetteBM
Releases Worldwide: October 20th, 2024

#2024 #40 #Alcest #Amenra #AntiqRecords #AtmosphericBlackMetal #BlackMetal #CultOfLuna #DownfallOfGaia #FrenchMetal #Hulder #JulieChristmas #LesDiresDeLÂMe #Oct24 #PostHardcore #PostMetal #Review #Reviews #Shoegaze #Silhouette #Sylvaine

The Flight of Sleipnir – Nature’s Cadence Review

By Maddog

The Flight of Sleipnir’s 2021 opus Eventide made ripples in the underground and grabbed my attention. The album blended stoner doom, acoustic folk, and post-metal, hardly groundbreaking elements. But Eventide distinguished itself by assembling them into a cohesive, beautiful whole, albeit one that hasn’t stuck with me. While we haven’t covered The Flight of Sleipnir since 2014’s V., I nabbed Nature’s Cadence as soon as I could, hoping it could catapult the band from goodness to greatness. Either way, I knew it’d be a breath of fresh air, and its gorgeous cover art was irresistible. Is Nature’s Cadence as memorable and moving as I hoped, or merely an interesting specimen?

While Nature’s Cadence doesn’t mimic any other band, it draws from a wide range of influences. The Flight of Sleipnir’s backbone consists of mid-paced stoner doom riffs wrought from simple melodies. These ideas branch in countless directions. At times, the guitarists Jeremy Winters and Clayton Cushman augment these stoner riffs with soaring melodies reminiscent of Elder. Other sections marry minimalist doom with a hypnotic post-rock aesthetic that resembles Amenra (“Vingthor”). Meanwhile, The Flight of Sleipnir infuses every track with folk elements that feel distinctively American. Placid acoustic guitar parts abound, while Cushman’s pedal steel adds subdued beauty. Accordingly, the vocals alternate between droning cleans and blackened screams. Even this laundry list doesn’t do justice to Nature’s Cadence’s diverse sound; the closer “Wanderer” alone deserves a treatise on its blend of foreboding spaghetti Western melodies, Maiden-esque guitar harmonies, and otherworldly Bergtatt escapades. Despite its variety, Nature’s Cadence never flaunts its uniqueness as a gimmick and never leaves any element underdeveloped.

Nature’s Cadence excels in its folky beauty, with mixed success in its heavier moments. The acoustic track “The Woodsman” showcases this best, gripping me through its narrative flow and its somber melodies. Clean sections of other songs hit just as hard; the opener “North” marries sparse Agalloch strumming with guitar leads that evoke David Gilmour on downers. Conversely, the doomy segments sometimes lose me. Some of The Flight of Sleipnir’s stoner riffs are too simplistic to make a mark (“Madness”), while others start strong but outlast my attention (“Vingthor”). As a result, Nature’s Cadence’s climaxes feel less explosive than they should. Still, the album’s redeeming moments make it hard to complain. The Flight of Sleipnir isn’t the next Kyuss, but the creative riffs and soaring leads of “North” are a stark reminder of their potential.

Nature’s Cadence’s greatest strength is how neatly it welds its pieces together. The seam between the album’s metal bangers and its serene folk elements is invisible. This is partly a result of melodic continuity, such as when “North” follows up a sparse acoustic passage with a doom rendition of the same melodies. Winters and Cushman’s guitar harmonies allow them to both mirror each other and establish striking contrasts, most notably on the spectacular “Wanderer.” Meanwhile, Dave Borrusch’s confident bass performance elevates Nature’s Cadence throughout both its peaks and its valleys. By laying down lead melodies during calmer moments (“The Woodsman”), enriching songs through subtle variations (“North”), and adding depth even with simple backing (“Vingthor”), the bass helps maintain continuity through the album’s stylistic about-faces. While the record’s longer tracks would benefit from more cohesion between different sections, The Flight of Sleipnir’s songwriting is impressive. Armed with a wide range of ideas and a dogged insistence on combining them thoughtfully, Nature’s Cadence stands out without sticking out.

Nature’s Cadence is a meditative experience that lives up to its ambitious title. On paper, folky stoner post-doom sounds like a prospective disaster. But The Flight of Sleipnir shines by placing fluidity first, resulting in a tight 39-minute record that does justice to its influences without sounding like a split. Punchier riffs would help the album hit harder during its heftiest moments. As it stands, while Nature’s Cadence won’t top my 2024 list, it’s a unique and rewarding listen for music fans of every ilk.

Rating: 3.5/5.0
DR: 10 | Format Reviewed: 320 kb/s mp3
Label: Eisenwald
Websites: theflightofsleipnir.bandcamp.com | facebook.com/theflightofsleipnir
Releases Worldwide: September 27th, 2024

#2024 #35 #Agalloch #Amenra #AmericanMetal #Doom #DoomMetal #Eisenwald #Elder #Folk #FolkMetal #IronMaiden #Kyuss #NatureSCadence #PinkFloyd #PostMetal #Review #Reviews #Sep24 #Stoner #StonerDoom #StonerDoomMetal #StonerMetal #TheFlightOfSleipnir #Ulver

Generation of Vipers – Guilt Shrine Review

By Dear Hollow

I’ve heard Generation of Vipers described as a Neurosis-meets-Amenra plus a substantial shot of aggression.1 With four full-lengths and a split with fellow Tennessee post-or-sludge-adjacent metallers under their belt, the act’s sound remains stalwart—or stagnant, depending on the listener. Thick and bottom-heavy riffs dominate, from staggered Isis-esque rhythms, and rolling punk-sludge beatdowns à la Black Tusk, to ominous plucking straight outta Abraham. Although a decade exists between the last full-length Coffin Wisdom and Guilt Shrine, it’s business as usual. Guilt Shrine will not change your mind about Generation of Vipers or post-metal in any way, but the aggression adds a jolt of intensity that rises above the muck.

Guilt Shrine’s tracklist tumbles across your ears like boulders in a landslide, Generation of Vipers chugging and barking their way through seven tracks and thirty-six minutes. While the balanced opener “Joyless Grails” and the southern-fried bruiser “Lux Inversion” deal with a sturdy balance of haunting melodies, highlights embrace the attack of cutthroat intentions. “In the Wilderness,” for instance, features a swarm of vicious riffs that hit you like the arsenal of post-metal Hammer Bro, balancing shredding palm-muting, punk chord progressions, and an unshakeable groove to get stuck in your head. “Elijah,” although not without its fair share of menacing placidity, utilizes these plucking movements and the empty silence to amplify the crushing weight that follows, concluding riffs pushed to a shuddering maximum. Generation of Vipers features a solid mix and production, guitars able to morph between galloping mammoth chugs and stinging melodies, while Joshua Holt’s vocals are sermonic and fiery, commanding the brig with charisma and fury, although the production has its issues.

Generation of Vipers adds a neat steel toe to the boot of post-metal. But the blueprint remains rooted in Through Silver in Blood and Panopticon, with touches of the Masses, and very little else sticks out beyond classic post-metal accomplished aggressively. This means that the crime that Generation of Vipers is guilty of is a lack of memorability resulting from the maximum safety and the seeming recognizability of the riffs and melodies. Their Amenra-isms are sparse, limited to albeit tasteful forays like “Elijah” and “Guilt Shrine,” or passages of “Lux Inversion,” but even the latter’s melodic template feels a tad like a weaker version. After the relatively pointless interlude “Doesn’t Mean Anything,” the most blatantly anticlimactic track here is easily “A Quiet Life,” no thanks to the production in which the ominous plucking quickly overpowers the riffs. It’s a problem that leaves a stain on “Guilt Shrine” as well—robbing the two tracks of their instrumental punch. As such, the album structure is a tad uneven, with the back half robbed of momentum.

Generation of Vipers isn’t interested in shaking up post-metal, and that’s fine. Guilt Shrine picks up exactly where Coffin Wisdom left off even after a decade, with sludgy riffs and an undeniable fire burning in the trio’s belly, with a touch of menace and darkness. However, although the production falters on the back end and there are weaker songs aboard, Guilt Shrine is a pleased-as-punch post-metal album that sounds a lot like Neurosis or Isis. I’m pleased to have found them, and I look forward to what they’ve got next.

Rating: 2.5/5.0
DR: 6 | Format Reviewed: 320 kb/s mp3
Label: Translation Loss Records
Website: facebook.com/generationofvipers | generationofvipers.bandcamp.com
Releases Worldwide: August 23rd, 2024

#25 #2024 #Abraham #Amenra #AmericanMetal #Aug24 #BlackTusk #GenerationOfVipers #GuiltShrine #Isis #Neurosis #PostMetal #Review #Reviews #SludgeMetal #TranslationLossRecords